Depression is common. It affects so many people that it is referred to as the "common cold" of mental illness. If we agree with international statistics, not having our own, about one in ten Trinidadians is always depressed. If you watch TV, listen to the radio or attempt to take on politicians regularly, you become even more depressed.
There seems to be a lot of mental colds in T&T at this time, just before the coming PNM oil boom and the great leap forward which is going to solve our problems, with the help of our latest foreign ally, El Presidente.
Depression seems to be more common in women. Approximately 25 per cent of women and 12 per cent of men will experience a serious depression at least once in their lifetimes. Among children, depression appears to occur in equal numbers of girls and boys. However, as girls reach adolescence, they tend to become more depressed than boys do. This gender difference continues into older age.
No one knows why women are more likely to become depressed than men. The figures may not be true. Men may simply be less willing to acknowledge emotional problems or more apt to drown their sorrows in rum. Rum, the local anti-depressant.
There is also a feeling, common among the local educated, that depression is a sign of personal weakness or a character flaw. "Real men" don't become depressed. They talk loudly, pump iron and run woman.
Women are undoubtedly under more stress than men. The female of the species is a lover, wife, mother, housekeeper, washerwoman, cook, secretary, doctor, nurse, driver and more. At the end of the day she has to look nicer than the lil ting down the road. Not to mention dealing with hormonal changes during the menstrual cycle, during and after pregnancy and during menopause
Any red-blooded Trinidadian man or woman knows the real reason why people become depressed. Listen to any radio talk show. It's called "horn." Or as one foreign expert described it in the psychiatric literature, after spending a year in St Ann's, the "Tabanca syndrome," preferably pronounced "Tabancor," the same way some of the regulars talk on radio. English, you see.
It's really mostly about loss. Loss of a loved one, whether through death or separation or a breakup, is often what triggers a bout of depression in a susceptible person. The most significant event related to chronic, recurring depression is separation from, or death of a parent, before the age of 11. But death or separation from any loved one does precipitate acute depression.
Depression in mothers is even more common. So much for the myth that children make their parents happier. Maybe fathers, but not all mothers. Is there something that women lose when they have children? Is it just more pressure?
As many as one in five mothers who bring their infants to the doctor for minor complaints are themselves a bit depressed. This is called the "baby blues" which is quite different from a "blue baby" but has the same effect on mother and child. A number of these moms are suffering from major depression to the extent of having suicidal thoughts. Many of them express their depression by complaining of physical things, like sleeplessness, back pains, headache or bowel problems.
Maternal depression does not only affect the mother. It affects her children. Specifically it affects their social and language development. At age three years, children of depressed mothers have more behaviour problems, like temper tantrums, sleep disturbances or destructive behaviour, than children of non-depressed moms. They also speak poorly and understand a lot less.
Depressed mothers also tend to blame their children for their own depression and to see their children's behaviour as something that is either wrong with the child, or something that the child was doing on purpose specifically to get at them. It's easy and convenient to blame children.
Children of depressed mothers are at huge risk of becoming depressed themselves when they become adults. This does not always happen. There are many other factors at play, like the extended family. When there are other adults around, someone can take up the slack and we all have memories of the kindly old uncle or auntie who was there during a particularly difficult period of family life.
No one knows why a depressed mother can produce an adult who is likely to experience depression later on in life. It may be a genetic predisposition. It may be the effect of stress hormones on the developing brain. It may be, that experiencing great difficulties as children, these adults may be more likely to have low self-esteem, feel powerless and become dependent on others to make them feel good about themselves. Whatever it is, the cycle of depressed mothers-depressed children-depressed adults, deserves to be researched more than it usually is.
In fact, depression deserves to be given more prominence everywhere. However, most of the leaders of society or those who should be discussing the topic, are themselves depressed and afraid. And who, being depressed, wants to read about depression. Doctor, heal thyself!
I wrote and published this in the Guardian in 2003. The topic has suddenly become popular. Young mothers are not supposed to "fall three stories." I hope her death and story will not go the way of Trini interest, ie become a nine-day wonder. I am afraid, being T&T, it will.